perspiration in the open air, at a season when the night may be presumed to have been cold, and in a person of so much fortitude and self-command, but an intensity of mental feeling, which cannot be accounted for by any natural cause? The causes of his agony which some men have assigned, with a view to evade the evidence which it affords of the expiatory nature of his sufferings, are manifestly inadequate. To talk of its arising from the foresight of the treachery of Judas, the desertion of his disciples, the unbelief of the Jews, and the wickedness of mankind, is to say any thing rather than acknowledge the truth; and to suppose that it arose from the fear of death, would be to degrade him below his own followers, many of whom encountered death in as terrible a form, not only with composure, but with triumph. Nothing but the burden of our guilt could have made him lie prostrate on the ground; nothing but an appalling sense of Almighty vengeance could have extorted from him the thrice-repeated prayer: "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me." Bitter must have been the ingredients of a cup, which he would have put away from his lips, although it was presented to him by the hand of his Father, and he had long purposed to drink it. How profound was his humiliation! We see him in extreme anguish, giving signs of ineffable distress by the agitation of his body; shedding tears, and uttering vehement cries; kneeling in the posture of a suppliant, and sinking to the earth under the dreadful pressure of his woes. But his sorrows were not yet at an end. The solemnity of this scene was disturbed by the intrusion of a band of ruffians, who, in obedience to the command of their masters, rudely laid hold upon him, and dragged him as a felon to the tribunal of the high-priest, where he was accused of the foulest crimes, and subjected to every indignity. He was reviled and insulted in all the forms which inveterate and unmanly hostility could invent: "I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting."* There, at the judgment-seat of Pilate, and in the presence of Herod and his courtiers, he was treated as the vilest of mankind, and at last was delivered up as a victim to the clamour of the rabble. We then see him led forth to Calvary, and nailed to a cross, on which he hung for some hours, till he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost.

Of the various modes of taking away life by violence, crucifixion is probably the most tormenting. It is one of the many contrivances of barbarity, the object of which is to make the unhappy sufferer feel himself dying. He was fixed to the cross with nails driven through his hands and his feet. Besides the exquisite pain caused by the perforation of so many parts full of nerves, which are the instruments of sensation, great torment must have arisen from the distension of his body, the forcible stretching of its joints and sinews by its own weight. To this circumstance he alludes in the twenty-second Psalm: "I may tell all my bones." All my bones are out of joint." There are some kinds of torture, which, by their severity, bring speedy relief. Nature sinks under them, and is released. As, in crucifixion, no vital part was touched, life was sometimes protracted for days. Our Lord expired sooner than the malefactors on his right hand and on his left, perhaps because he was partly exhausted by his previous agony; but even his sufferings lasted for six tedious hours; for they began at nine in the morning, and did not end till three in the afternoon.

66

Some modes of putting persons to death are deemed more honourable than others, although it is the merest fiction of imagination to attach an idea of honour to what is in its own nature a disgrace as well as a punishment. The most ignominious was reserved for our Saviour, who suffered the death of a slave. Crucifixion was a Roman punishment, but was accounted so infamous

VOL. II.--13

• Is. i. 6.

I

† Ps. xxii. 17, 14.

that it could not be inflicted on a Roman citizen; only the offscouring of mankind were nailed to the cross. The very manner, therefore, of our Saviour's death was a part of his humiliation. He was exhibited on Calvary as a man who had no civil rights, who was protected by no law, whom society regarded as an outcast; as one who had not only forfeited his life by his crimes, but deserved to be associated with the lowest and most worthless of our species. Accordingly, to add to the ignominy of his sufferings, and to express the utmost contempt for him, two male factors were led forth to be crucified along with him two robbers, as the word signifies which we have translated thieves, who, by their daring outrages, had called down upon their heads the just vengeance of the laws. In the midst of these he was crucified, as if he had been the worst of the three; and thus the prophecy was fulfilled, " And he was numbered with the transgressors.'

The last circumstance which demands our attention, is, that he suffered an accursed death; for the law of Moses had said, "Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree." There is some difficulty in settling the meaning of this denunciation. It cannot signify that every person who was hanged upon a tree, was doomed to eternal perdition; because the sentence which fixes the future state of men, depends no more upon the manner of their death than upon any other trivial circumstance. But whatever be its import, it is applied to our Saviour; and we are taught to consider the manner of his death as an indication that he died under the curse of the law. It was Pilate who condemned him to the cross; but the sentence was ratified at a higher tribunal, and with aggravations which the power of the Roman governor could not add to it. He died by the sentence of his Father acting as a righteous judge, and subjecting him to the punishment of sin. Great, therefore, as were his bodily torments, there were unseen sorrows which were far more severe; sorrows of the same kind with those which caused his agony in the garden, and the extremity of which drew from him that mournful complaint, "My God, my God! why hast thou forsaken me?"‡

How great was his humiliation! The Lord of life and glory appeared like a common mortal and was distinguished only by the intensity of his sufferings, and the state of complete dereliction in which he expired. The multitude looked on with unpitying eyes: heaven frowned in preternatural darkness, and all consolation was withheld from him.

We shall have finished this view of the humiliation of Christ when we have added, that his body being taken down from the cross, was committed to the tomb, where it remained in a state of insensibility for at least thirty-six hours. Had it been immediately restored to life, it would have been said that it did not die, but only fainted on the cross; and the evidence of his messiahship, which his resurrection affords. would have been weakened. Had it continued longer under the power of death, the natural process of corruption would have commenced, unless preserved by a miracle. But the Scripture had foretold that the Holy One of God should not see corruption;" and, accordingly, the time was abridged; and on the morning of the third day he arose in triumph from the grave.

When Joseph had taken down his body from the cross, he laid it in his own sepulchre, which he had hewn out of a rock. May we not observe in this circumstance an illustration of the poor and destitute condition to which he had descended? Although it was his own world in which he sojourned, ye: he was in it, not as a Lord, but as a servant-not as a possessor, but as a stranger who has no interest in any thing around him. His entrance into it was humiliating; his passage through it was comfortless; and when at last it § Ps. xvi. 10.

• Is. liii. 12.

† Gal. iii. 13.

Matt. xxvii. 46.

cast him out as one unworthy to breathe the air, and see the light of the sun, there was no place to receive him save a tomb which one of his disciples had prepared for himself. It was the sepulchre of a rich man-but its present tenant was poor indeed. Yet why, we may say, should he have had a sepulchre of his own? Other men may provide a solitary dwelling for their bodies, for the sleep of the grave is long. It is their last abode, of which they will keep possession for ages; for "man lieth down, and riseth not; till the heavens be no more, they shall not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep.' But our blessed Lord was like a way-faring man, who tarries only for a night in some resting-place which he finds on the road. The next morning he hastens away from it, and pursues his journey to his home.

Our Redeemer stooped low indeed when he assumed our nature, but lower still when he submitted to be laid in the grave. This is the last degree of humiliation. All the glory of man is extinguished in the tomb. If we viewed his prosperity with an eye of indifference, we now pity him; if his splendour excited our envy, the feeling dies away and hostility relents, when he, who, like a flourishing tree, spread his branches around, now lies prostrate in the dust. Who is this that occupies the sepulchre of Joseph? Is it a prophet or a king? No; it is one greater than all prophets and kings, the Son of the living God, the Lord of heaven and earth; but there is now nothing to distinguish him from the meanest of the human race; the tongue which charmed thousands with its eloquence is mute, and the hand which controlled the powers of the visible and invisible world is unnerved. The shades of death have enveloped him, and silence reigns in his lonely abode.

In the Apostles' Creed, it is said that "Christ descended into hell." With respect to the meaning of this article, there has been a great diversity of opinion. Some have supposed it to signify his burial; and, at first, when his descent into hell was mentioned, his burial was omitted: but both are now found in the creed. Others, again, have interpreted it of the state of the dead, or death itself, and of the place of souls, which is divided into two regions, the one in which the patriarchs and saints who died before his coming were detained, and the other the receptacle of the souls of the damned. Some supposed that he went to the former to carry the patriarchs and saints with him to heaven; and others, that he went to the latter place to triumph over Satan, and by preaching the Gospel, to deliver such of his captives as should believe. These are notions which do not receive the least countenance from Scripture, and may be dismissed without wasting time in refuting them.

It would not be incumbent upon us to take notice of the article under consideration, as the creed in which it occurs, although bearing the name of the Aposties, is a composition long posterior to their age, were it not that its language is borrowed from the Scriptures, into the meaning of every part of which it is our duty to inquire. The following words are found in the sixteenth Psalm, and are applied to our Saviour by Peter, in the second chapter of the Acts: "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." Ads, which is the word used in the New Testament, is derived from a privative and do, I see, or dry, the infinitive of the second aorist. It signifies, therefore, the invisible state of the dead; and, although it may sometimes denote the grave, it admits of a more extensive sense, and comprehends the place of the soul. The same is the meaning of the Hebrew word, b, in the Old Testament. It is derived from, to ask; and denotes the place concerning which inquiry is made, because it is unseen and unknown. The word hell, is now used for the place of the damned; but originally it signified something obscure and concealed, and is of much the

same import with and ads. This, therefore, is the sense of the passage in the Psalms: "Thou wilt not leave my soul in the invisible state; nor suffer thy Holy One to see corruption." Our Saviour is speaking of his death, by which his soul and body would be separated; the one going into the unseen state, the other being laid in the grave. The words are a prediction of his resurrection, and are applied to this event by the apostle: "David, seeing this before, spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption." God would bring back his soul from the invisible state, and reunite it to his body, before it was corrupted.— This explanation frees the passage from the perplexity in which it has been involved by those who, supposing and ads to signify only the grave, understood D and fox, which we translate soul, to mean the body; and thus, besides affixing an unusual and unnatural meaning to these words, represented the two parts of the verse as tautological. The view which we have given, preserves them distinct, and retains the common sense of the terms. The receptacle of our Saviour's soul was the invisible state, and the place of his body was the grave.

The humiliation of Christ manifests the greatness of his love, the riches of his grace. It was for us, men, and for our salvation, that he assumed human nature, and abased himself to the dust of death. He drew a veil over his glory, that he might remove our reproach, and raise us to heavenly honours; he groaned and died, that we might obtain immortal felicity. He has acquired title to our everlasting gratitude, by the most astonishing sacrifices.

Let us learn humility from his example. Pride should be for ever renounced by the followers of a lowly Saviour. Every part of his conduct, during his abode upon earth, is calculated to put it to shame; and we have in vain traced his progress from the manger of Bethlehem to the cross of Calvary and the sepulchre of Joseph, if we retain our unbending attitude, and refuse to stoop to our brethren at the call of charity. The scene which we have contemplated should dispose us to condescend to the meanest, and to divest ourselves of every worldly honour, when we are called upon to do so for the glory of God. "Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls."†

LECTURE LXI.

CHRIST'S STATE OF EXALTATION.

The Resurrection of Christ-Preliminary Remarks Respecting it—Statement of the Evidence of his Resurrection.

ALTHOUGH, during the humiliation of our Saviour, a veil was drawn over his glory, yet some rays occasionally broke through, which manifested, to attentive spectators, his essential and official dignity. The sublime doctrines which he taught, the astonishing miracles which he performed, and the testimonies of the Divine approbation which were given to him, by voices and signs from heaven, proclaimed that he was the only-begotten Son of God, and the promised Redeemer of Israel. The dark scene of his death was illustrated by prodigies, which signified that he was no ordinary sufferer; for, at a time when there could be no natural eclipse of the sun, because the moon was in † Matt. xi. 29.

• Acts ii. 31.

full opposition, there was darkness over all the land, from the sixth to the ninth hour; and when he expired there was a great earthquake, which splitted the rocks, and laid open the tombs, and the veil which concealed the holy of holies in the temple was torn, by invisible hands, from the top to the bottom. Even his burial was not without honour; for, although he had been put to death in the most ignominious manner, and under the imputation of the greatest crimes, his body was wrapped in fine linen and precious spices, by two persons of high rank, and was deposited in a magnificent sepulchre.

These circumstances, however, gave only a partial relief to the deep gloom which had settled upon him. His life, from the manger to the tomb, was a course of profound abasement. It was not till his resurrection that the glory which was to follow his sufferings commenced. That event, which removed the ignominy of his cross, revived the hopes of his disciples, and is the sure foundation of our faith in him, it is the design of this lecture to consider.

It is related by the four evangelists, and referred to in innumerable places by the other writers of the New Testament, as a fact, of which no doubt was entertained among Christians; insomuch that, assuming it as a first principle universally acknowledged, they reason from it in support of the doctrines of the gospel, and for the confutation of errors. In the narratives of the evangelists there are some discrepancies, which have been represented by infidels as affecting their credibility. Learned men have taken great pains to remove the apparent contradictions, and to show how the different accounts may be reconciled. I shall not enter upon this discussion at present, but shall content myself with referring you to those who have treated directly of this subject, and of whom I shall mention two, to whose writings you have easy access,-West's Observations on the History and Evidences of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ; and the seventh preliminary Observation, and the one hundred and fiftieth section of Macknight's Harmony of the Four Gospels. Were we at present considering the Evangelists as inspired writers, it would be necessary to examine every thing in the account which they have left us that might seem to indicate that they are as fallible as other authors, and have actually erred; at present, however, we appeal to them, not in this character, but merely as persons who have related a fact of which they were competent witnesses.Now, although we should allow that they are at variance in some particulars, this would not invalidate their testimony in the opinion of any reasonable man, as they all agree in the main fact, and differ only in some matters which are not of much importance. In other cases, we deem the evidence sufficient, when we find substantial truth with circumstantial variety; that is, when a number of witnesses positively attest the same fact, but disagree in some inferior points, which do not materially affect the truth of the general statement. Minute accordance rather awakens a suspicion of previous concert, while occasional discrepancy affords a strong presumption that the witnesses are independent, and that every man speaks from personal knowledge. The testimony of the Evangelists would, I have no doubt, be received as consistent and credible by any civil court, as not one of them has denied the great fact of the resurrection, or discovered the slightest hesitation in affirming it; and the differences among them, even although they were real, and not merely apparent, as has been satisfactorily shown, consist only in circumstances upon which the general truth of the history does not depend; as the precise time in the morning when the event took place, and the number of individuals who were present at a particular moment. It is manifest, that they did not write with a design to obviate objections; and that each of them, without considering what had been said, or might be said by others, recorded the event in the manner which occurred to his own mind. It is by comparing all their narratives, that we come to know the whole circumstances of the case, and are